Cherington's promise: Calm after storm

Friday

Oct 28, 2011 at 12:01 AM

A curious lack of angst greeted the defection of Theo Epstein to the Cubs earlier this week. Epstein, after all, constructed two World Series-winning rosters in Boston, something no one had done since the Woodrow Wilson administration.

By BRIAN MacPHERSON | Journal Sports Writer

A curious lack of angst greeted the defection of Theo Epstein tothe Cubs earlier this week. Epstein, after all, constructed twoWorld Series-winning rosters in Boston, something no one had donesince the Woodrow Wilson administration.

Maybe that has to do with the spotty track record in free agencythat still dogs Epstein. Maybe that has to do with the desire forsomeone to clean house as much as possible following aninexplicable September collapse.

Maybe, though, it has to do with the sense around Boston thatEpstein left the Red Sox in awfully good hands. Far from ahouse-cleaning, the ascension of Ben Cherington to the top of thebaseball-operations department represents an endorsement of thephilosophies by which the Red Sox have abided for the lastdecade.

"He's had such a well-rounded development," Epstein toldreporters in Chicago. "He's got so much integrity. He's so bright.He's got great management skills of people. This guy is going to doa fantastic job. I'm excited to see it happen. I wouldn't have leftthe Red Sox if he weren't the guy who was going to take over, andif I wouldn't have had assurance that there would be continuitywith the whole baseball-operations team."

Epstein made clear in his introductory press conference inChicago that he believed it was time for change for the sake ofchange, not change for the sake of a philosophical overhaul.Cherington didn't sound like he was about to shred the processesEpstein developed in Boston.

"It's my job, as part of that change, to preserve what we'regood at and also serve as a catalyst for the change that we need,"Cherington said. "What's going to work moving forward is notnecessarily exactly what's worked in the past."

Quite a bit of what Epstein did worked. Quite a bit of whatEpstein did didn't work.

Given that Cherington was there for all of it, that's both agood thing and a bad thing. It's actually difficult for an outsiderto know whom to credit for the accomplishments and whom to blamefor the missteps of the Epstein era.

One of the most significant accomplishments of which Epstein canbe proud is the development of a farm system that produced JonLester, Dustin Pedroia, Jacoby Ellsbury, Clay Buchholz and DanielBard - with more talent still in the pipeline, albeit mostly at thelower levels.

Cherington supervised all of that. Jed Hoyer - now backalongside Epstein with the Cubs - tended to have his hand in themajor-league side more often, but it was Cherington who supervisedplayer development during the middle of the last decade. That'swhen Lester, Pedroia, Ellsbury, Buchholz and Bard came of age.

In the final two drafts Cherington oversaw before taking alarger role on the major-league side, the Red Sox selected WillMiddlebrooks, Anthony Rizzo, Casey Kelly, Kyle Weiland, RyanWestmoreland, Tim Federowicz and Ryan Lavarnway.

The Red Sox farm system has produced so much talent that it'seasy to take for granted. Long gone are the days when Adam Everett,Casey Fossum and Shea Hillenbrand were the best players the Red Soxfarm system was producing.

"I've seen Ben on draft day immerse himself in that entireprocess, the preparation for it," Red Sox president Larry Lucchinosaid. "The folks in baseball operations work no harder than they doin the months before the draft, and I've seen Ben show a facilitywith that process with those people."

In the two years since Hoyer left, Cherington has had quite abit to do with operations at the major-league level, too, in waysboth publicized and not.

"It was Ben Cherington who asserted that Adrian Beltre would bea terrific fit with this team, and the one-year deal that wascarved there was something that he worked hard for," Lucchinosaid.

Lucchino couldn't have picked a better example. Beltre turnedout to be one of the shrewdest free-agent signings of the Epsteinera, a brilliant transaction that unfairly faded into obscurityalong with the underachieving team on which he played. Beltre hit.321 with 49 doubles and 28 home runs to go along with outstandingdefense at third base, earning both a trip to the All-Star Game andMost Valuable Player votes.

On top of that, when Beltre walked away as a free agent, henetted the Red Sox the draft picks they used to select prospectsBlake Swihart and Jackie Bradley Jr. last June.

Part of the reason Epstein and Cherington worked so welltogether is that they share many philosophies of rosterconstruction.

"We both want relentless lineups that are full of guys who geton base and drive up pitch counts," Cherington said. "We bothbelieve in having as many well-rounded position players on theteam, guys that can defend and run the bases and impact the game indifferent ways. We both believe in the importance of a core groupof young players and investing in scouting and player development.We both believe in having guys on the pitching staff with stuffthat pounds the strike zone."

If Cherington stays true to his core principles, the rosters heconstructs aren't going to look much different from the rostersEpstein constructed - and that's why no one seems altogether upsetthat Epstein found himself a new job.

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